Thursday, April 25, 2013

Writer's note: After much thought and consideration, I finally decided to retire at the end of the school year. Below is a column that more or less gives my reasons why. And while I am ending my teaching career, I have several new beginnings I am excited about and will write about later. And, of course, I am hoping this decision will provide more opportunities to devote to blogging… again.

******

For years now in my teaching career, I’ve felt like Lucy Ricardo
working on the candy assembly line, but without the benefit of eating all that
chocolate.

­­

It doesn’t help
that our schools tend to look like factories filled with teachers who
fanatically and frenetically try to keep pace in an environment that rewards
uniformity.

Like Lucy, I have found myself
working at warp speed, expected to churn out cookie-cutter children all wrapped
up and ready to go as “lifelong learners,” “productive citizens” or whatever other
education buzzword is trending at the time. This, of course, must occur in a “stimulating
and challenging environment” and be packaged in a neat little box lined with a
“better future.”

At the
educational factory, the operative words are “standards” and “measurements” and
“outcomes” – all topped off with standardized testing to make sure everything
and everyone is properly and uniformly measured. Over the years, I’ve watched
more young teachers than I can count run a white flag up their own standard and
quickly retreat to another profession.

Like Lucy, they’ve said in
so many words: “Listen, Ethel, I think we’re fighting a losing game.”

A few years
ago, I stumbled upon a study cleverly entitled, “The Widget Effect.” The report
showed how administrators and school systems treat teachers, not as individual
professionals, “but rather as interchangeable parts.”

The study
called us “widgets” and predicted that public education would never really
improve until administrators and policymakers quit viewing teachers that way.
Finally, someone was singing my song.

I’m not sure
how this widget thing has become so entrenched in our educational system. It’s
not like it works anywhere else. If someone swapped a Bill Gates or a Warren
Buffett with a mediocre-no-name CEO, the results would be, well, quite
different.

So why do we
think we can swap out the Gloria Shields, the Mary Pulliams and the Dow Tates
of our little educational world with interchangeable widgets and still yield
the same results?

The widget metaphor
has stuck with me like an obnoxious radio jingle. I haven’t been able to shake
it off or ignore it. Instead, it’s made me only that much more defiant. Just
because school feels like a factory, that doesn’t mean I have to act like a
widget.

So I’ve tried
to work harder and smarter, and eventually, that’s meant I’ve also worked
longer hours. I’ve tried to do more, achieve more and be more until I’ve begun
to feel like I belong in that Army recruiting commercial.

Rebelling
against widgetry earns you a certain stature. I’ve been called many things. Some
good, some bad and some that rhyme with what my students call me, Richie. The
worst, though, has come when I’ve been brusquely dismissed as not being a “real
teacher” because, you know, I teach an elective – another word for “pointless”
in widget-speak.

I’ve survived
three school districts, more than a half-dozen superintendents and eight
principals. Every year, I’ve struggled to show that somehow my work matters in my
classroom and my student publications.

No
interchangeable widget here. No sirree, Missy. Not me.

Along the way,
I’ve managed to stay married to one man, raised my own two children, gained
weight, lost weight, battled a kidney disease, watched cancer erase both
parents, walked 60 miles for the Three-Day for the Cure, written a book, championed
the First Amendment and become fearless.

Most
importantly, during that time, I’ve had the privilege of engaging in the
education of hundreds of children, and because of them, I’ve become a better,
stronger person – one who cannot and will not be unceremoniously reduced to a
widget.

And so because
I am too stubborn to succumb to The Widget Effect, this year marks the end of
my career in public education. Twenty-seven years has earned me a graceful exit
rather than a retreat. No white flags here. I may not have prevailed, but I
have endured.

That’s probably
the best outcome anyone could hope for in a broken system waiting to get fixed.
The assembly line may have beaten Lucy, but it didn’t break me.

6 comments:

Anonymous
said...

You made a real difference in my life. I know alot is not a word, thanks to you. I also learned that no matter where you are in the world, if you hit MLK Blvd, you're in trouble. That's saved my butt more than once. /notawidgeteitherAnnYear 1, AKA: the ones who broke her in!

This is very sad to me but something I, and anyone who has ever had the privilege of taking a class from you, can say is hardly a surprise. It is true Ritchie style and it is unfortunate that other students will not have the opportunity to learn from someone who is passionate and pushes for nothing short of your best. It was an honor being able to take 2 years of classes with you and there isn't a day that goes by where I don't think back on high school and your classes are among the first memories that pop into my head. I look at the product of your class in yearbooks and newspapers with pride and then look at my roommates yearbooks and wonder how the heck you took such a strange group of people and used us to produce something amazing. You are no doubt among my favorite teachers I have ever had and I commend you for going out with a bang like we all expected you to do. Good luck in whatever it is you decide to pursue, I'm afraid to ask "What will she do next?"

This is very sad to me but something I, and anyone who has ever had the privilege of taking a class from you, can say is hardly a surprise. It is true Ritchie style and it is unfortunate that other students will not have the opportunity to learn from someone who is passionate and pushes for nothing short of your best. It was an honor being able to take 2 years of classes with you and there isn't a day that goes by where I don't think back on high school and your classes are among the first memories that pop into my head. I look at the product of your class in yearbooks and newspapers with pride and then look at my roommates yearbooks and wonder how the heck you took such a strange group of people and used us to produce something amazing. You are no doubt among my favorite teachers I have ever had and I commend you for going out with a bang like we all expected you to do. Good luck in whatever it is you decide to pursue, I'm afraid to ask "What will she do next?"

Retirement is wonderful! I'm still learning new things and involved in education on my own terms. I do a lot of volunteer work and help individual teachers. I do as much as I want when I want to. I find myself busier now then when I worked but I'm enjoying myself so much more! Good luck! I hope you continue to blog about your new adventures!

I can't believe it! Wanted to wish you all the very best for the future. I hope you will continue blogging. I know you will miss your students and am absolutely sure they will miss you. Good luck Carol.

I would like to personally thank you for not only trusting me somehow and some way to be an editor of yours for a year, but for also leading me to my major in journalism, and even to helping me pick my career. It seems every week someone argues with me that journalism is dying and that I am insane for picking news writing, but I like to just think of you as my teacher and think there isn't too much wrong with being insane if it means doing what I love. I may have never gotten to express to you the difference you made in my learning because I was too much of an immature brat at the time, but you made such an impact on me. I dreaded any kind of writing I was forced to do until I was drafted by a stranger into your world of publications at the high school. By my junior year, I was basically begging for my assignments to be writing ones, because it became the only thing I really felt good at and comfortable with. I am sitting here pulling another all-nighter, writing a paper for another summer course that I am positive I am only taking in order to get further in school and closer to my dream job as a journalist. All thanks to you I am working my butt off for what people call a dying profession, but I have faith it will pay off, and I owe that mindset to you. I am glad you are getting out of the school system by the way, you aren't a widget, you are the generator of the generations that have gotten to take a class with you. If they can't realize it, they don't deserve you. It will be hilarious to see how publications go without you there. And thanks for always being real with your students. Although there were moments we weren't grateful for signing up for your classes, it always paid off when I realized how brave and talented you were when we accomplished our job. Not to mention I appreciated that someone could finally shut my loud mouth up in a classroom setting.

Buy the book or the chicken gets it!

**************************Just a reminder that the opinions here are mine and mine alone…but hey, you probably already knew that. Oh, and one other thing, no clients, students, The Chicken, other rubber chickens or animals of any kind were harmed in the creation of this blog.

And don’t forget to check out my website…

Search This Blog

About Me

ShareThis

Get Richie On Oprah & Save the Chicken!'s Fan Box

My "proper mug"

This is the photo shot by my buddy Mike McLean. I originally had it as my profile photo but everytime I posted a comment, this rather large photo would follow along. I found that, well, rather annoying, and I hate it when I annoy myself. So now I'm posting with a bunch of monkeys which sadly is probably a bit more accurate. I have left this photo up only because Mike is such a fab-u-lous photographer and because he insists I need to have some sort of "proper mug" on my site. Apparently, the boa one and the monkey one don't qualify. Go figure.